The Ethics of Inciting Mob Violence

Tucson is at the heart of a battle being waged as diversion away from the slow cook coupe d’etat Bush & his buddies are staging.

It isn’t just the Orwellian unending “war on terror” that our government is using to create a hateful fervor in the masses, the government is creating absolute pandemonium on the border by creating a cultural “other” of the migrant laborers who cross our southern border so as to blame them for economic woes that they cannot tie to the Islamic world.

One of my favorite, factually rich blogs written by D. Neiwert suggests that “The entire meaning of the Iraq war -- and by extension, the "war on terrorism" -- is inextricably bound up in the psychological manipulation of the voting public through a relentless barrage of propaganda.”

MSNBC reports, “The Southern Poverty Law Center said the leader of the anti-immigration group Border Guardians has secretly urged the nation's largest neo-Nazi group of white supremacists to launch a campaign of violence against undocumented workers.

The manipulation of manufactured cultural icons is glaringly obvious in Tucson because we live in the real situations from which the media pulls stories for reconstruction and manipulation.

If you have read my entries of 6/1/06 & 6/8/06 you know that paramilitary provocateurs are masquerading as counter-protesters here in Tucson whenever there are counter-recruiting actions in front of the strip mall that houses recruiting offices on Speedway Blvd. These folks are aggressive and lewd at best and may be downright dangerous because they are pumped up on propaganda and take encouragement from the tolerance of vigilantes on the border, the Tucson Police’s apparent decision to selectively enforce the laws when it comes to 911 calls relating to recruitment protests, and the specific calls for violence against the “other” by the talking heads of the radical right.

There are many other cases of right wing wackos acting out in Tucson because of the media-hype about the folks the media derogatorily call “illegals.” The burning of the flag of Mexico during one of this spring’s immigration marches here in The Old Pueblo is a classic example of this.

While I feel it is imperative to address the escalating violence here in the streets, it is equally important to recognize that incitement to violence is illegal and even more dangerous when it comes from a respected representative of the radical right. Ann Coulter is the prime example of this sort of criminal behavior. Her venomous attacks on innocents and straw men reveal a disdain of truth that rivals that of Goebels. Why such hate speech is tolerated escapes me. The only thing I can point to is the parallel between the increasing selective enforcement of laws at all levels of our society that mirrors the increasing economic disparity between the haves and have nots in our Country.

Before you say that drawing comparisons between Goebels and Coulter is unfair or silly, please review the Bush family history and its connections to Nazism. The connection between the radical right and the use of propagandists to create and justify hatred and violence is nothing new. Ann Coulter is known for statements such as “Where are the skinheads when you need them?” While this much quoted example is from a couple or so years ago, she has escalated from implication to actually goading her audiences to act from a mob mentality and “take out” those who disagree with her. And then please read the entire blog entry of the Loyola college student who recaps Coulter when she was clearly encouraging her followers and fans to turn into common thugs as this excerpt from a Loyola college student’s blog entry attests:

I went to my seat and prepared myself mentally to take in Ms. Coulter objectively…. As I chuckled sarcastically at her [Coulter’s] remark, a girl turned around and gave me a dirty look. I sort of gave her a dirty look back and before I knew it, she told me to "Shut the fuck up." I was so taken aback by her comments, I said, "uhh, not you shut the fuck up." Then she turned more towards me and said, "I'll fucking kick your ass." I was so SHOCKED that this girl had the actual nerve to say this to me let alone on a college campus lecture, all I could say was well, "that's typical." I'm looking around me at the chaos and I see peaceful protestors getting yanked from the crowd, that I find security and tell them that a girl had just threatened me! He went to confront the girl and all of a sudden all of her friends were like "No, she threatened her!". You can only begin to imagine my shock and indignation about this girl's lack of principle and ethics. It really was the definition of mob action and what people will do when they lack the any sort of backbone...The protesting from the balcony only increased with time with shouts of "ANN IS A RACIST" to even an immature, yet mildly amusing, call for "Show us your tits." Ann addressed her supporters in the crowd with this statement. "You're men. You're heterosexuals. Take 'em out." She chided them further when they did not rise. Before you knew it there was about 25 students marching to the balcony to supposedly "take out" the protestors above. I saw a priest holding students back and deans and security warning the students to go back to their seats. Chaos erupted.

I found the initial link to the above description of Coulter’s in Orcinus, an award winning investigative reporting blog that rises to the level of real journalism and that often exposes the nefarious subtext of the radical right’s conservatism by writing about well-documented linkages between conservatives and hate groups.

[Please note: I use the term “radical right” rather than religious right. The right is no more or less religious than the left and to use that term implies just that. To imply or make such a statement is blasphemous. To suggest that the relationship with or personal understanding of the divine of any member of the left is less authentic or genuine than that of the right contradicts one of the essential guidelines upon which our country was formed. We are one nation under God. God is not defined therein, and the reason God is not defined is that our founders understood that each person must have liberty to think and speak and believe as his or her heart guides. We must stop attempts to devalue, debase and deride difference. Open, healthy populations exhibit variation within any subgroup that is greater than variation between any two groups. Healthy living systems, and that includes political and religious systems, are grandly interwoven from rich variations of quantities and qualities of type and kind. The right is as diverse and beautifully faceted as any other group. So is the left. Diversity is a sign of vitality. Any system that becomes homogenous or monotonous is a dying system. Attempts to impose one viewpoint on a population are attempts to murder that population.]

Now I will get back to the overarching topic of this blog for today: The “overlooking” of criminal behavior and blatant disregard of ethical violations by radical right “leaders” who encourage further reprehensible, illegal behavior on the part of the common citizen.

Researching this topic yesterday I found several exemplary instances of this behavior by elected officials or those in government service well back into the 1990s. Most of these criminal acts went completely unpunished. My brief listing of them may be instructive.

1995 Contract with America puts out contract on House members.

Wanted poster released by Republicans has potential to incite violence: Democrats - 'Liberal Democrat Wanted Poster' sent by Republicans to their contributors.

"This racist and anti-government propaganda could put our lives in danger," Rep. Maxine Waters of California--one of 10 Black House members whose photo appears on the mailing--said in USA Today. "I am requesting the FBI and House security to advise me and other members of the risks we face because of this.

1998 Candidate for state legislature calls for assassination of the President.

Bob Davies, a Republican candidate for the Montana State Legislature, spoke at a Republican fundraiser and candidates' forum near Bozeman on October 9 and declared that President Clinton "should be shot." He also said Clinton was guilty of treason and should be executed for selling satellite technology to the Chinese government, and that his actions were no different than those of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg. Neither Montana Governor Marc Racicot nor any other official interrupted Davies, opposed his threats against the president, or reported Davies' comments to law enforcement authorities. Advocating attacks against the president is a federal crime, punishable by five years in prison or a $250,000 fine.

1999 State party leaders calls for death of health care providers

Missouri Republican State Committee member thrown off State Committee per threats of violence against abortion providers and distribution of wanted posters with the pictures of doctors who perform abortions.

2004 Police attempt to incite violence against protesters censored from media.

A blog from overseas clearly summarizes the police actions against any and all protesters at the RNC:

“More striking, perhaps, is what was not shown by the media -- the media reported that more than 1,000 protesters had been arrested for legally protesting, the media failed to mention that these protesters had not even begun their protest and were following the instructions of police at the time they were arrested. A senior newscaster from CBS, a major American network, even stated in a rarely shown clip that the protesters were not only acting completely peacefully but that they had conformed with all special requests made by the New York City police, only to be arrested for doing so.

It was not until a year later, in 2005, that there was any acknowledgement that police provocateurs were caught on videotape inciting violence among peaceful protesters at the RNC in New York in 2004.

2005 Right whips up frenzy to incite violence.

An increasingly prominent element of the frenzy whipped up by the Christian right in connection with the case of Terri Schiavo, the Florida woman on life support for the past decade and a half, is direct or indirect incitement to violence.

On March 25 the FBI and local police arrested Richard Alan Meywes of Fairview, North Carolina, for allegedly offering $250,000 for the murder of Michael Schiavo and $50,000 for the death of Circuit Court Judge George Greer, who ordered Terri Schiavo’s feeding tube removed.

An FBI affidavit alleges that Meywes wrote: “It is my understanding that whoever eliminates Michael Schiavo from the planet while inflicting as much pain and suffering that he can bear stands to be paid this reward in cash.” The affidavit notes that the same sadistic email refers to the recent killings of a judge in Atlanta and family members of a federal judge in Chicago.

2005 Congress encourages violence against judges.

After the shooting deaths this year of a judge in his Atlanta courtroom and the mother and husband of another judge in her Chicago home… (Judges) say the pointed criticism of judges by Republican congressional leaders, which reached a crescendo during the Terri Schiavo right-to-die case, threatens to exacerbate the problem of courthouse security.

Gilmer, TX state District Judge Lauren Parish expressed concern about what these Republican congress members said. "The more I hear that rhetoric, the more I get concerned, because there are people who are extremists who might take that as a license to do things," Parish says.

Ongoing:

Decisions about who can vote in Ohio are being made by Mr. Blackwell, a candidate for governor. Mr. Blackwell should hand over responsibility for elections to a decision maker whose only loyalty is to the voters and the law.

If we open our eyes we will see what is going on.

Tucson
Coulter
incite violence
right
mob
propaganda
immigration

Paving the way for voting fraud and a police state.

I had to be pulled kicking and screaming into the arena of political commentary. Well, in truth, it wasn't that dramatic. But it was holding my nose. I'm no Mr. Smith, as in Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, but entry into this whole sordid stratum of political culture makes my stomach churn more often than not.

I wish I could be like that kid in The 6th Sense and see dead people, but instead my gift and curse is to see dead democratic principles. This week the streets here in Tucson are littered with bodies, and my stomach is churning from two disturbing incidents. I feel I have to write about these things. Even though living in a world where such murders are common is unpleasant, and I would love to live in a different world, I cannot ignore dead bodies. If I did not feel it is my duty as an American to do everything in my power to preserve the principles of justice and equality as well as the mechanisms of representative democracy that were put in place by this country's leaders in the 18th century I would be a far happier person. Living day in day out with this crap is depressing, but someone has to do it.

The first thing about which I’m concerned is the weekly Counter-Recruiting Demonstration that takes place in front of the military recruiting complex on Speedway just west of Tucson Blvd. On Wednesday morning. A little history is in order here. We are now in the fourth year of ongoing weekly demonstration against the war in Iraq. Last year after what I still contend was false arrest (the case was eventually dropped) of the Raging Grannies of Tucson and several news reporters and a blogger (me) for reading and reporting on the reading of a statement about why the Grannies wanted to enlist and then singing a couple songs and leaving the recruitment station within five minutes, a counter-protest group began arriving every Wednesday morning. The presence of counter-demonstrators is great in and of itself; freedom of assembly and freedom of speech are essential components of our liberty. But when these counter protesters are demonstrating, not to express their viewpoint but rather to suppress another group's message, this is no longer something of which to be proud.

At first the pro-war group stayed on the north side of the street respecting the three-year long precedent of the anti-war group assembling on the south side. Within a few weeks though the pro-war group moved to the south side of the street. They began heckling the pro-peace demonstrators. The pro-war group then encroached on the space claimed by the pro-peace demonstrators. There was some interaction with the police at that time when the police asked both sides to stick to opposite sides of the street. At some point, coincidentally beginning just after a complaint against the police involving the Raging Grannies arrest was filed, the police stopped responding to calls from the pro-peace group about threats and intimidation made by the pro-war group.

The police recently, in June 2006, have responded to calls for assistance, to complaints about intimidation and requests for protection from assault, but only after the demonstration ends. Yesterday morning, Wednesday, June 7th, a gentleman called the police to report an assault made on his person as he attempted to exit his vehicle near the demonstration. A man in a red hat who was among the counter-protestors was the person who assaulted him according to what he told the police. (I didn’t see the event, but overheard the call to police. It took the police over 40 minutes to respond and the man in the red hat came back to the gentleman who reported the assault at least a half an hour later, which was conveniently after I had stopped video-taping and had gone to my car. I returned to the area to ask a friend about a meeting time. The man in the red hat had crossed Speedway and then crossed the side street to come over to the corner where the pro-peace demonstrators had gathered near where a mobility impaired older woman protestor sat with the banner. A crowd of pro-war people had collected along with the man in the red hat as he and a man in a pink shirt were having a heated discussion about a car door. As I attempted to get close enough to report what was happening, another pro-war man who had also crossed Speedway to get to the pro-peace NW corner front of me when I said to another pro-peace demonstrator as I was shaking my head, “you can see the maturity level, you can see the maturity level…” Another man who had crossed the street and was carrying a large wooden staffed flag with a sharp edged brass eagle on top, began shouting in my face, “You sure can, can’t cha!” Then once again much louder, “Can’t cha?” He was so close that his flag was touching me, so I then asked him, “Would you not touch me please” when he turned to confront me and began ranting that I had touched him with my “little” camera, and asked the child with the camera, “Did you get it on film?” I began to respond, “my camera…” then thought better of it as he was just deflecting my request and loudly ranting in my face. At that time I then turned my attention back to the man in the red hat and the pink shirted man, when I heard the term “yellow faggot” come from the Red hat man.

I managed to transcribe the following:

Red hat man: …you yellow faggot. Never been in the military.
You don’t like what I’m saying?

Pink shirt man: I went to Vietnam. For three years. (pause) you little…f (inaudible)

[Red hat man is screaming and coming toward pink shirt man.]

Red hat man: Why you. What unit were you with? What’s the unit? Name your unit!!!

[A woman then drags red hat man across the street. He is still screaming.]

Red hat man: Faggot!! Yellow faggot!

Things calmed down for a couple minutes until one of the remaining pro-war men [the one holding the flag, I think] tried to provoke the pro-peace folks by insulting them again.

Flag man: “You don’t believe in God so what do you care? You don’t believe in God, so what do you care? What do you care? What do you care?

Verbal assaults of a very crude sexual nature were also made. My friend was called, and I quote, “an ugly old c-nt” by one of the young males who accompany the adult pro-war people to these demonstrations. These adolescent verbally abuse the pro-peace people pretty much constantly. (I apologize for the crudeness of this language, but I feel it is important to accurately report the severity of the vile language used by these folks.) When I had a recorder near the young man, he cleaned up his language a bit and referred to me as an ugly, old hag.

People are becoming frightened. The pro-war folks who all dress in military clothing harass, intimidate, and assault the pro-peace folks. The women and youth who arrive with these folks verbally insult us. Yesterday I was told as I was filming that I would have been hung like Benedict Arnold during the Revolutionary War. The man was quite clearly intimating that I should be hung.

Can you imagine what people who are just walking by these folks think? You can see it on their faces. They are afraid. Women hug their purses tight to their sides and stare straight ahead as they pass, not making eye contact. They often have to walk through a group of the young pro war men who will part long enough to allow them through, but who intimidate by blocking the sidewalk before and after passage. This same man who implied that I should be hung told me the counter-protestors were trying to move the peace protesters away from the recruiting station because they were against the troops. That is what he said folks. They are there to keep the peace folks away from the public property in front of military recruiting offices. They are not there to support the troops they are there to get the anti-war folks to move. That isn’t exercising their rights; that is keeping others from expressing theirs. The police should respond for that infraction alone. But they will not respond until after the demonstration has ended.

The only thing the peace folk want is for the “counter-protesters” to stay away from them and not interfere with their freedom of expression.

The corruption within those in government service and with local government and in Tucson is getting to not only intolerable, but to outrageous and frightening levels.

When the police choose which laws to enforce and instruct individuals to act in ways that will allow the police to arrest them a police state has arrived.

When the County Board of Supervisors votes to purchase machines that control the voting process in spite of the fact that they are easily hacked and produce or use no auditable data. That’s the second concern disturbing me these last few days. Without fair elections and with the police making the laws or at least choosing which ones they will enforce, Tucson is not a good place to be. But this is my home and I will not run away…. I will work to make it a great place to live once again, how about you? (Oh… more on voting in the very near future.)

More Contextual Info on the reported Bush Condi Affair?

Of course equally public photos of Clinton did not prove anything in and of themselves either, just as this one of a Condi and George's hug and kiss proves nothing either.


Now I haven't said it is true, but the possibility that and the increasing buzz about Georgey Bush and Condi Rice having an affair is just so reasonable that it is difficult to ignore. Is it possoible that this may have been what Hillary was talking about when she made that infamous comment on January 16th of this year comparing administration tactics to that of a plantation?

It would be delicious to think so, but unfortunately the likelihood of that possibility is negligible to none. She was not talking about anyone in the White House. What she said was, "When you look at the way the House of Representatives has been run, it has been run like a plantation, and you know what I'm talking about." Senator Clinton said this before an audience at the Canaan Baptist Church of Christ gathered together for an MLK Day observance earlier this year. Seems extremely unlikely that she was talking about any George Bush, Laura Bush, Condoleeza Rice love triangle.
Sorry to remind folks of this, but as juicey a morsel as this would be... it just isn't going to hold up. The best support for this illicit liaison still rests in the Freudian slip Rice made when she reportedly said, "my husb... er .... I mean the President" at a Washington dinner party.

This story is not going away!

Yowza -- Laura Bush MOVES OUT and MTV goes beyond pablum.

There is some sort of sea change going on here.

WMR (Wayne Madsen Report) is tracking the Laura Bush story: First Lady reportedly discovers that "The Decider" decided to violate his marriage vows -- moves out.

---

An MTV 2 show made South Park look like Sesame Street in "Wonder Showzen" a show created by Augenblick Studios, augenblick means blink of an eye for you monoglots. Anyway the Comedy Channel has now picked up the reruns and at least in my time zone on my cable company's lineup "Wonder Showzen" follows "The Daily Show" & "The Colbert Report."


-------

Today is shaping up to be a different sort of day. The first blog search of the day turned up the Bush/Rice/Laura story. The first email I opened today had the Augenblick pic in it. Synchronicity of some sort I suppose.

[rice]
[laura bush]
[mayflower]
[affair]
[george bush]
[sex]

It's Starting To Get Personal.

Some military men are coming around to an anti-Iraq War perspective, while some not in the military but like to pretend they are are hoping to bring the fight into the streets of America.

From gulfnews.com

'In an interview with The Sunday Telegraph, Major General John Batiste, who resigned last year after 12 months stationed in Iraq's Sunni Triangle, said the Pentagon chief [Rumsfeld] had caused "unnecessary deaths" by committing "strategic blunders of enormous magnitude".'

From poughkeepsiejournal:

(Per protest at West Point graduation)
Wearing sergeant chevrons and shouldering a large American flag, Jason Peterson of Albany said he believes Bush intentionally lied about the reasons for the war, betraying service members who signed up to defend their country. ‘‘That sort of thing is not what people should be sacrificing their lives for,’’ said Peterson, a former Marine who served in the first Gulf War.
And Peterson expressed concern for soldiers and Marines returning from combat not only with physical injuries, but the psychological trauma associated with deployment to a war zone: ‘‘You can’t just switch it off.’’

We need some of these brave and gallant officers to come to Tucson to protect our protestors from the Freeper Goon Squads whose behavior here is getting more and more and more threatening and aggressive with each passing day. Today I went down to the main recruiting office on Speedway to participate in the weekly peace demonstration (okay, anti-war), and, as has been the case since last summer, the counter protestors were there with their huge flags, and their expensive professionally printed banners, foul mouths, personal insults and generally reprehensible behavior. They purport to be patriotic Americans who are just "counter-protesting" but interaction with them has proven that this is not the case. Whenever there is not a police presence these purportedly patriotic individuals that I choose to call "pidiots" (cause they sure as hell aren't patriots) surround peace protesters, step on toes, push and bully them. Today individual thugs threatened women protestors by saying that the peace protestors' time "was comin'" and that he and others (the militia type thugs) were going to clean up the border and rid it of traitors on both sides of the border. They have been escalating their aggression and rather suspiciously police have chosen to stay away. These pidiot bullies jab the sharp metal ends of their 10 ft. flag poles within a couple inches of the faces of elderly women. They get within inches of protestors and come from "their side" of the street to stand literally over them (these thugs are much larger than the women and elderly men protestors) and cover the peace signs and placards with their flags. This morning at least one of the "pidiots" was using such lewd and liscientious sexually explicit language and graphic insults and threats that it was nauseating and frightening to those who could hear.

We need calm matriotically inclined people to join with us to document these attrocious threats.

The police will do nothing. They have chosen to advise the peace protestors that until someone is hurt, that they can do nothing. They are clearly buddies of the recruiters and the lines between police and military are very blurry here near the border. Remember this is the same police department that ordered the Raging Grannies onto private property so they could arrest them.

The zeitgesit here in Tucson is weird to say the least. We are in the heart of the battle zone that is being created by the campaign to create an "other" from the migrant laborers so that the uniformed and easily influenced people of the US have someone to label as "enemy." Activism here has been such a staple in the community for so long that people who might be out in the streets if they lived in other places think that others here in Tucson are "already taking care of it."

The disturbing things about these "Freepers" is that they attack individuals, have come to people's homes, gang up on individuals, take encouragement from the neo-nazi element of the vigilante groups on the border and are bouyed up by the fervor of Memorial Day weekend, and the knowledge that the Tucson Police will be conveniently absent on Wednesday mornings although they were there almost every Wednesday before the Freepers started showing up. These for the most part are powerless males (mainly white) who feel that the power they were raised to believe they would have as adult white men in America has been unjustly denied them. These are the folks who grasp at and gobble up the rhetoric of the rulers of the government, media, and such. They believe they have a right (possibly grant by the Divine) to power, and will attempt to assert dominance over anyone they see as weaker than themselves or who just happen to be in vulnerable or physically isolated at the moment. These folks are potentially very, very dangerous.

Remember Greensboro, NC -- Nov 3. 1979? If not you should look it up. Start here. Or just read this excerpt:

Police - who had left the demonstration at 10:30 a.m. to take a "lunch break" - arrived only after the shooting had stopped, even though an informant for the Greensboro Police Department and a federal agent were with the Klansmen and knew their plans.

One of the first things police did after their arrival was to arrest demonstrators - including Willena Cannon, who tried to stop their frenzied attack on Nelson Johnson, a fellow organizer, who had been stabbed in the shoulder by a Klansman. "I knew if I didn't do they'd kill him," she said. She was arrested and charged with interfering with arrest; then she was taken to jail and interrogated. "They'had me in this little room," she said. "I didn't know where my children were. My body literally shut down."

When did this happen? Not in the 1940s, '50s or '60s, but in 1979. Emily Mann's new play, "Greensboro: A Requiem," now playing at McCarter Theatre tells the story of that day, Nov. 3, 1979, and the events leading up to it.

Klansmen and American Nazis shot 13 people that day - several of them right between the eyes. Five died. Others - including Paul Bermanzohn, who was paralyzed - were permanently injured.

Even though the video coverage showed the murders clearly, an allwhite jury acquitted the Klansmen and Nazis of all charges. A civil trial eventually determined collusion between the Klan and Greensboro police in the slayings and ordered the City of Greensboro to pay damages to the widows and children of the victims.

But no Klansman ever paid a penny in damages. Nor did any Klansman ever spend a day in prison for the murders - not even Dave Matthews, who admitted to police that he thought he had shot three people. "There were some innocent people shot, I reckon," he said. "But I was shooting at the niggers."

Any ideas how to disarm these pidiots?

Negroponte Afraid of Protest

I received an email this morning that got me to thinking about the lily livered cowards who are responsible for the deaths and torture of hundreds of thousands of my co-habitants of this planet and how we all need to be protesting in front of the houses of the slime who "rule" here in the U.S. Unfortunately many of the fascists who live in AZ live in gated communities, so you really can't get very close and the rent-a-cops who guard such secure palatial estates are often inexperienced, untrained, and far more likely to shoot.... but we still need to be doing these actions all over the country. The comfort these war criminals enjoy must be ended.

Isn't it amazing how quickly Negroponte screams that he needs someone arrested when his space is compromised? I wonder is he now sees how his victims might have felt at the onset of his evil practices --- before the actual torture or murder was carried out. I cannot condone violence, and such demonstrations are perhaps psychically violent, but there is a part of me that is actually happy that these "leaders" have probably begun to feel some of the same sort of fear which they have so casually injected into the lives of so very many people in so very many places.

Anyway, here is a portion of this a.m.'s email that discussed the DAWN action.

We in the DC Anti-War Network (DAWN) Weekly Action Group returned to

Director of National Intelligence's Negroponte's 3100 Cleveland Avenue NW

home last night for a silent vigil in memorial for the dead and tortured

throughout the world (specifically, Honduras, El Salvador, Nicaragua,

Iraq) and instead were welcomed to the strange security world of John

Negroponte. Ten days previously, a DAWN activist had been detained for

half an hour by a CIA police officer, though was subsequently released by

the DC police without charges. The activist had been on public ground

protesting and had not committed a crime, but the CIA police officer had

explained that the Ambassador wanted someone arrested for this, a quote

that has been corroborated by audio tape. (For last time, see jsmacdonald.blogspot.com.)

This time, a security person (didn't identify himself this time except

over his phone as "John" - and we didn't ask being that it was a silent

vigil - but may have been CIA like last time) immediately came out of an

SUV to announce upon the arrival of 12 of us (ultimately 15) that he had

called the police and that they were on their way.

We set up outside of his house and were as quiet as could be, holding

signs and banners and lighting candles. Inside were John Negroponte and

what appeared to be a wife and someone else. Within a few minutes, they

looked out the window, put down their shades, and turned off the lights.

Occasionally, we could see them peaking out the window at the spectacle

below.

Several MPD (DC police) showed up, a secret service agent, another

security person related to the home. If they were CIA like last time I

can't say, but they were belligerent and as nasty as one might expect.

They went around with notepads taking notes on each participant (and later

photographs), saying out loud their description, sometimes with derogatory

things to say about people's weight or their hair color or what was on the

signs. They had to admit that we were being "very peaceful," "very quiet",

though the security man John was quick to point out, "with a lot of

attitude."

As mentioned, several DC police showed up. One higher ranking one

attempted to engage us in conversation, but we stayed silent. Another of

our group was getting concerned by police presence and was trying to

protect others in the group by keeping his bike between John and the rest

of the group, which led to a testy moment. Our friend thought it best to

get himself out of the situation, and he did by leaving the vigil.

As for the neighbors, one set of neighbors called us derogatory names, but

another set toward the end drove up and asked if we were protesters. One

of our group came up and told her that it was a silent vigil aimed at

Negroponte to which she exclained loudly, "I'm so glad! It's about time

somebody protested him!" Then, police quickly whisked her away while John

said, "That's rude."

At times, while most of us continued to aim our stares and our signs

toward Negroponte (and thankfully, the security/CIA? wrote down what every

sign said, not to mention what people's t-shirts said, what brand of bag

people were carrying on their backs, etc.), it was absolutely impossible

not to notice the darkness of 31st street glaring with several police

cars, with officers walking amongst and between us, attempting to bait

people out of silence.

The police chummed up to John and his co-worker having banter. Early on,

one police officer asked John who lived here. He quietly said something

like, "Ambassador John Negroponte." The cop quizzically said, "Who's

that?" Then, a very quiet inaudible explanation, followed by a look of,

"Oh, that's who it is" on the police officer's face.

At the end, one officer told us we needed to be off the road we'd been on

for one hour. So, we walked onto the sidewalk in front of his house, which

forced the police out of the way. A few minutes later, an hour having

passed (which was the generally pre-agreed upon target time for staying)

we left as a group or in small groups of two, as John for a short time

decided to follow us down the street. He wasn't done taking pictures and

was frustrated that some hadn't given him a clear shot. Of course, they

could see us through security cameras, so I don't know why they needed the

mug shots in addition.

We took our own pictures, audio, and video to document what was happening.

We've had very noisy protests that drew almost no police presence. This

one drew an enormous amount, probably due to last time or out of boredom -

who knows?

We were there to disrupt John Negroponte and express to him our outrage,

albeit this night silently. We were also there to remember the dead and

tortured, which despite the police, was how I spent most of my time. I

noticed a huge, beautiful tree in Negroponte's yard and wondered how he

would feel if someone had destroyed it. What a tragedy that would be, and

I became sad at the thought. And, yet that tree serves to mask the

murderer and torturer that is John Negroponte, a man who has no qualms

about spying on any one of us. I went to think of people killed by death

squads and was forced to confront a lot of intimidation tactics. Perhaps,

we were the intimidators last night. The truth hurts, and in this case, it

should.

DAWN & The Essential Nature of Activist Reporting

My recent trip to DC connected me with some signigicant sources of information. I feel these channels are essential to liberty. Jim's Eclectic Blog by a DAWN (District of Columbia Anti War Network) member illustrates the fanstastically informative nature of blogs. I need to be reading blogs from D.C. that cover, as in reporting, demonstrations, protests, and CD (that's activist lingo for civil disobedience... you know like those trouble makers Ghandi and King engaged in.)

We should not have to be the media, but we do have to be. We have to issue press releases, do our own photography, videography, and write our own articles. Where the hell is the media, the press, the fourth estate??? We should not have to do all this documentation for the public record. I try to cover aspects that are not being covered, but I'm not impartial. I really don't have time to cover all sides of issues. That is the purpose to which the press evolved. Doing all these jobs drains us energetically, but we are up to the task. We allow other aspects of our lives to slide... for me it is a biography of Gene Stratton-Porter that isn't getting written, and developing a Greening of Management Training Program for my consulting business, and cleaning my house. But I digress....

Anyway, this morning as I was reading a forwarded email about the continuing harassment of DAWN activists for legal, protected forms of demonstration, I clicked through to read Jim's blog, I realized that I had digital photos that no one else was apt to publish from the action at Rumsfeld's house on May 18th. So, for free flow of information's sake, here is a bit more info about the impromptu action at Rumsfeld's house.

DAWN first came to my attention when I marched to Rumsfeld's House with a few dozen other folks after the Network for Spiritual Progressives Prayer Action. My CODEPINK friends Katie and Toby were arrested with two guys from DAWN. Katie just wanted to deliver a note to Rumsfled and Toby was going through the hedges after Katie as she didn't want Katie to be arrested alone. I think Toby might have gotten her pink umbrella hung up in the hedge. --- Note to self: drop props before any stealth operation. --- This was a first time arrest for both women.

My goddess, I am so inspired by these women who were both at a time in their lives when they were willing to be arrested to draw attention to the war criminals who are waging for profit corporate warfare and writing off the murder of hundreds of thousands of people as a necessary expense of their ill-gotten gains. These women are peace soldiers. Katie could have been hurt or killed. DC jails are not fun places. Neither my friends nor the other women with whom they were held who had been arrested and were being held for a myriad of charges were given water or food for over 24 hours. This is apparently standard procedure. Denying fluids can kill people -- it is torture. There is a war on our own people and torture is being used on us just like it is in the bases used in extraordinary rendition, in GITMO, in Abu Ghraib... it may be a tad more sublte, varying in degree, but it is just as immoral and reprehensible and a classic example of a slippery slope. We apparently tolerate torture in our lots of our jails, such as in Chicago.

I think we need to bring back the common usage of terms such as ill-gotten gains, profiteer, carpet bagger, yellow journalism, jingoism, propaganda and sensationalism -- and thus the nuances of meaning between motive and reporting. Just a thought.


Photo credits: All photos © Julia Field, 2006 excluding the photo of the Ghandi and King section of a wall at Busboys and Poets that is mine and which you may use but which I would like an attributive link back per the creative commons license for all non-copyrighted materials on this site.

It Is About Honor, Matriotism and Truth.

As I begin writing this I am watching Bush lay the Memorial Day wreath at the tomb of the unknown soldier in Arlington. Rumsfeld is there with him. I'm incensed. I take Memorial Day very seriously.

As a child I always accompanied my mother as she went to the cemetary on this day. We would take flowers and care for the graves of all our relatives who were buried there. At each grave I would learn the story of the life of that ancestor. There is a lump in my throat as I think that no one back in that rural area I call home will move the flags stuck in the ground in a clump at the edge of the cemetery to the graves of the war dead. Today no one will pay respects at the grave of my Uncle Carl who fought in WWII, joining the Army Air Corps even though he was in his 40s when we joined the fighting of WWII. He was wounded, lost the hearing in one ear, but survived to eventually retire from NASA where he worked on optical technology that went to the moon in Apollo missions.

My brother, a Marine serving in Vietnam, caught the brunt of a morter round explosion under his flack jacket in the battle of Khe Sahn. He was bent over lifting a wounded buddy into a medevac helicopter when shrapnel sliced through him. He probably lived only because they pulled him into the chopper and could begin life-saving care immediately.

Several branches of my family came from Anabaptist, or Brethren, communities and as such were pacifist. I was not raised in this faith, but I was raised to believe in the principles that informed this faith. While I may not believe that war is ever the answer, neither do I disrespect those brave soldiers who were and are ready to give their lives for principles in which they believe. There are principles for which I would give my life. And I'm an imperfect pacifist, if my life or the life of any one I love were directly threatened I would probably fight and kill.

I am disgusted by the war criminals Bush and Rumsfeld who sully the honor and memory of women and men who were willing to fight and die for liberty. Bush went AWOL. He's never faced danger. He comes from people who fancy themselves aristocrats when they are nothing more than corporate oligarchs. Rumsfeld wanted to create a machine-driven killing corps to assure himself a place in history as the implimentor of a kind of warfare conceived by the Nazis. This melaglomania, unchecked by an administration for which war was an abstraction, created wars and killed well over 100,000 thousand people for financial gain, sent in far fewer troops than were needed to accomplish the ill-conceived and largely strategically unplanned war.

These men are not fit to tread on the hallowed ground of Arlington. I am offended, saddened, and hurt not only by the actions of this corrupt cabal, who speak of volunteer forces but enforce a stop loss program that uses up our troops humanity on mandatory third tours of duty in Iraq. I am also disappointed by the success these men have had in pulling the wool over the eyes of the American people. I sometimes feel that patriotism has been irreconcilably tainted by this administration's abuse of the term and the people who identify with the now tarnished term. I have begun calling myself a matriot -- loving of my place of origin but tempered with a mother's vision and wisdom. Men could be matriots too. It makes as much sense as women being called patriotic.

On this Memorial Day 2006 I am honoring all the dead of our nation's wars rather than barbecuing and celebrating the de facto arrival of summer. I am also honoring those women who are the core of the peace movement this time around, those women who risk imprisonment, physical harm, the loss of all private communication, firing from their jobs, separation from or loss of families and a normal life to keep the truth about this oil war and the criminals who create and fuel it in the public consciousness. So many people and the media, traditional channels of information, have fallen into a silent chasm of the oppressed. Thank you women from Gold Star Families for Peace, thank you Grannies, thank you WILPF, thank you CODEPINK, thank you Women Say NO to War, thank you Women Say Enough... thank you women who rise from that bleak fear-filled place to wage peace and speak truth.

This Memorial Day let us honor the war dead and those who work for peace so that no more war memorials need ever be made.

Coupe d'etats, euthanizing corporations and reclaiming our voting rights.

Okay, it is time to have an absolute blogging onslaught per war, peace, war criminals and how these topics along with vote count integrity roll up into a ball of decit that is the single most important issue of our lifetime. Then we must follow it up in the streets in calm peaceful but decidedly outraged action until our upper level war criminals are in prison and the rationally planned deconstruction of the framework they have built up in our society has begun. We have to reclaim the American Dream and the things that made us great once upon a time: justice, equality, peace. Corporate crime relates to all this but the conviction of Ken Lay and Jeff Skilling is just a tiny chink in the armor of a vicious transnational global oligarchy whose practices effectively make slaves of all but the miniscule few who control this system.

Here are some links to help you understand my belief that we have to address the criminal theft of our government by sick, evil men who waged a horrific, totally false war waged by our children, husbands, wives, brothers, sisters, and parents on the back of the Iraqi people. Then we need to get to work on euthanizing corporations by getting rid of the rights that corporations have foolishly been given since the noble conception of our country as a place of liberty of people.


First I recommend reading the Rolling Stone article about the criminal manipulation of our votes in order to steal the 2004 election. (Not to mention the 2000 election that was also criminally manipulated to create a Bush II administration in the first place.)

Then go see Sir No Sir if at all possible! Then figure out how to get this movie to the Guard Troops and all those soldiers conscripted via the "Stop Loss" program and the troops who are on their THIRD TOUR in Iraq. Didn't we learn anything from Vietnam? Those soldiers who signed up for a third tour of duty were commonly thought to be damaged goods, slightly crazed, and certainly best stationed in battle where their desire to kill could be channeled. This is why we are having all these attrocities in Iraq now. Men and women can only live under the constant pressure of urban warfare for a short time before the learned cultural behavior we call humanity is so eroded that we begin to operate as killer apes rather than civilized men and women.

Finally go to the Abolish Corporate Personhood section of the WILPF site and begin to teach yourself about the slow erosion of our Constitutional Rights by the creation of corporations that are have been given all the rights and none of the responsibilities of real person. Flesh and blood, mortal people cannot compete against immortal disembodied people.

Oh, one more thing. Do not fall victim to their attempts to divide us into factions. That is all the hoopla about immigration and securing our borders is about. It is an attempt to create hatred and suspicion of all brown skinned persons by one-time middle class folks who have seen their standards of living slip on an economic incline that has been greased by corporate greed. If this administration was concerned about border integrity they would not have facilitated the evacuation bin Laden's family and other Saudi citizens across our borders when all other flights were grounded on 9/11/2001.

Then you can begin to remedy the illicit takeover of our government and the criminal trail of tears that can be found behind the villainous leaders who masquerade as our governmental administration.

Frames for the Military

It is always difficult to determine patterns from within the design...but that is what I spend a good deal of my life trying to do. I am but a fiber temporarily interwoven within a living fabric. Not terribly a terribly important part, but still, over all I am a part of the design. Single actions from single folks can make for perceptible change. All of Fort McNair now knows about the documentary film , Sir No Sir, that deals with military history and Vietnam because of an attempt to suppress the dissemination of information about the film. This is such a perfect example of how feeding information or energy into a process, even by reacting against it, strengthens that original process.

That is one of the reasons I'm not big on protest or anger as those are reactions against something and as such are not particularly effective in creating change. As Gregory Bateson said, "Information is any difference that makes a difference."

The challenge before the progressive community is to make a difference without inadvertantly strengthening the corporate/government stranglehold on our U.S. democratic Republic. Things really don't change very much, very quickly, or very often. But perspectives, both individual and collective, change constantly. Perceptual change, that mental shift in perspective can be thought of as reframing. The reframing that occurred at Fort McNair was inadvertant, but conscious reframing can also effect change.

Spiritual progressives are reasserting value and morality as topics clearly within their ow appropriate domain of discourse. Peace activists are reasserting their right to document military history. Citizens are reasserting their right to have their voices heard in the House and Senate.

Now if we could only frame the highest high ups responsible for the torture at Abu Ghirab rather than the low level non-commissioned folks such as Cardona whose trial ended today (verdict has not been determined) who are taking the fall for indemic corruption at the highest levels of government in the U.S. (also non-coms, but in a very different way.)

How much does the war & nuclear weaponry cost your community?

A great data source for examining government expenditures by various geographic zones (from zip codes and school districts to states) by spending areas.

http://database.nationalpriorities.org

May 17 and May 18 Action Pics from DC

We weren't sure if this was really the trash being picked up or an NSA vehicle picking up the Pink House's trash for scrutiny.


Me (in the pink of course!) with Vietnamese dignitaries and the young American translator who made conversation possible about the similarities of Vietnam and Iraq Wars as well as the environmental and economic degredation that is only now being transcended in Vietnam. We also spoke of my daughter's trip through Vietnam last summer and how she loved the land and people.

This was after I was tossed out of the Senate. 21 minutes or so into this video.


Whole lotta folks attend the Network of Spiritual Progressives "Pray-In" or Prayer Vigil in Lafayette Square Park across from the White House.


Blurry but peaceful sea of Peace Signs at the Prayer Vigil. It was beautiful.

This was followed by the attempt to deliver the no bombing of Iran petition signatures to the white House and the march to Rummy's house. You can see a video of these actions at politicstv.org.

Spying has no impact on our trying....

My DC action updates/coverage are still being posted at pinktucson.livejournal.com with when I can... but this email that was forwarded to me from a friend seemed more appropriate for this blog. Why? Because so many of the activists I've recently spoken to have experienced the same thing of which this woman writes. And several of us who were doing the Mothers Day 24 hour vigil had our hard drives crash multiple times within a couple weeks before the event. I try not to live in a world of suspicion and paranoia.... but it makes one wonder.

Here's the email Ellouise recieved and forwarded to me.

(Prior to this email of today, she was unable to get into her yahoo account even though her children using the same computer had no trouble with theirs) Soooooo, this is a little spooky...

----

I got a new modem today. My internet connection seems faster but
loading my email is still slower than other sites. I'll bet you
thought I would never wonder about that. Well you thought wrong.

I also opened up ANOTHER new email account. Having no access to my
email for most of last week was more than a tad inconvenient. It did
put a bit of a wrinkle in organizing our Mothers Day Peace Vigil, but
I did that the old fashioned way by using the telephone. I figure it
will take you awhile to find this new email account and I will enjoy
it working as fast as it does for everyone else on that site until you
find me there.

I spent the morning emailing my political contacts, fellow peace
activists and reporters and gave them my work email to use in case of
emergency. I figure you can't shut down that email without a flurry of
court orders or some such hassle that I am really not worth.

I have turned off my home phone. An added benefit to that is the money
I am saving. Besides, every time I answered it lately it was either a
hang up or a wrong number. So no great loss or inconvenience there.

I got a new ATM card too. Funny, I had that card for years and never
had one problem with it. I also rarely used it since it is for my
savings account and I do try to be a good girl and leave that account
alone. But right before I went to Crawford for Easter, I transferred a
bunch of money into that account and used that card while I was in
Texas. Then I used it in New York two weeks later when I was there for
the UPJ rally. Imagine my surprise when all of a sudden it stopped
working right after I got back from New York two weeks ago.

I was on the radio today! Did you hear me? Oh I know, that is most
likely a dumb question. I hope you paid attention to the part where we
talked about the loss of constitutional rights. The host of the show
told me she wants me back! So free up your Saturday afternoons. I may
even say hi to you at some point.

You see, agent mike, you don't scare me. My dad was a history teacher
for 40 years and I was the only kid in my kindergarten class who not
only had memorized the preamble to the constitution but could also
explain it and the Bill of Rights (well, as well \ s a 5 year old could
explain it). Point is, I could have told you when I was 5 that spying
on American citizens who are political activists is WRONG.

I think about my dad a lot these days. He was a proud Democrat. He was
very active politically and had all of his kids knocking on doors for
JFK in 1960. But Dad was somewhat conservative. He called me his
looney leftist daughter. He never did understand the need for a
feminist movement, as he always treated women as equals. He never
agreed with me about abortion but he thought the Vietnam war was
wrong. When he realized that he was most likely on one of Nixon's
enemies lists, he was furious. He also told me in 1967 that I had
better hope the USA NEVER got involved militarily in the middle east,
that we would never be able to get out once we got in. He disagreed
with Carter getting involved even though it was to negotiate a treaty.
And he was livid when bush sr went to war with Iraq in 1991.

See, Dad was really proud of his days as a soldier in WWII. But he
hated war. He had night terrors for the rest of his life. I can
remember many times seeing my mom or my dad sleeping on the couch in
the living room when I was a kid and I thought that was normal for a
long time. When I was finally old enough to realize it wasn't, I asked
my mom and she told me my dad tried to kick her out of the foxhole in
the middle of the night at least two or three times a week. My dad
also didn't let us watch war movies. He was a huge John Wayne fan, but
we only saw his cowboy movies. Dad said he had fought in a war and he
saw nothing entertaining about it. He thought it was wrong for
Hollywood to make money from war movies. So I guess you can say he
planted that peace activist seed in me when I was very young.

My dad was the smartest man I have ever known and he didn't raise no
fool. I know he would be proud of me today. I think of him every time
I stand with my fellow peace activists, holding signs to protest this
despicable war. I know he would worry about me and I doubt I would be
able to tell him about my phone and email and bank card problems, as I
would not want to worry him. But I know for a fact that if he were
alive today, he would most likely be right there next to me,
protesting this war and demanding the impeachment of this monster of a
president.

So I am not afraid of you or of my government. Bring it on. Oh, and I
will be back at the park tomorrow at 4:00 and again on Tuesday at
5:00. (I am thinking of making a new sign that says "HI AGENT MIKE!")
I also have a meeting on Monday night with those subversive Quakers.
We are going to plan our rally for the 28th. That should be a nice day
for you, as we expect a good turnout and it will be easier for you to
blend into the crowd.

As always, PEACE!!

Pics from Pink Mother Vigil

This Weekend I'm blogging on another site!

Heyo Peoples,

I'm in D.C. for the Mothers Day Vigil at the White House. Woo ha.... and as I'm doing CODEPINK stuff, I will be posting from pinktucson.livejournal.com. Tell your friends! This is gonna be great!!!!!

See you on livejournal for a while.

Peace,

Nancy

Watch out if you are a female in army who was born in the spring or early summer.

This is a rather bleak subject but the following two articles both came to my attention today.

The Increase in Army Suicides Is Not 'Slight'

A letter to the Editor published Tuesday, May 2, 2006 in the Washington Post.

In an April 22 Washington in Brief item, an Army spokesman called the increase in soldiers' suicides from 60 in 2003 and 67 in 2004 to 83 in 2005 a "slight" increase. But in public health terms, this is an epidemic, representing a 30 percent rise.

This statistic fits with a striking increase reported last month in mental health care by U.S. veterans of the Iraq war. A third of veterans are seeking psychiatric help, but military authorities refer only 5 percent of those on active duty for such evaluation.

Our soldiers must learn to kill and destroy. They endure difficult conditions in Iraq, and they have no say in their assignments. Yet they are expected to return home to resume civilian status without incident.

The job of mental health professionals is to address such serious internal conflicts, suicide being only one result. Post-traumatic stress disorder, alcoholism, family dysfunction and antisocial behavior are others.

E. JAMES LIEBERMAN

Potomac

The writer is a clinical professor of psychiatry at George Washington University's School of Medicine .

If you are born in April May or June you may be at a far greater risk of committing suicide than if you are born during seasons other than spring/early summer according to a British study reported by BBC News. Here are some excerpts from the article.

"Scientists have established seasonal birth trends for a number of diseases including some cancers, heart disease and brain tumours.

Other research has found more patients with schizophrenia, brain degenerating disease Alzheimer's, epilepsy and sleep disorder narcolepsy are born in December than any other month.

Equally, mental illnesses like depression and mood disorders and alcohol dependence are more frequent among those born during the spring and summer.

And 10% of suicides in England and Wales occur among people with these disorders."

And risks for women are even greater.

Among women, nearly 30% more suicides were committed by people born in the spring while among men the rate was nearly 14% higher than those born in the autumn.

Overall, the risk for people born in spring to early summer was increased by 17%.

The Border is an Imaginary Construct

I haven't gotten to address some of the "big topics" of the last couple months. "The Border" and "Immigration"are probably ones that have gotten the biggest nudge from corporate media. Some say the coverage is just distraction from issues the powers that be would prefer we forgot. Hundreds of thousands of people are taking to the streets to say we are here and we have the same inalienable rights as you .

I've seen and heard all sorts of takes on this topic, but the one I haven't seen is what I'm writing about today. Borders are not real. They are imaginary constructs drawn up by high level political entities to advance some aspect of a political agenda. Rain is real. Soil is real. People are real. Borders are not. We must remember this! I live in the Sonoran Desert. It is a real place with distinct patterns and types of soil, rainfall, flora and fauna that sets it apart from other distinct ecological zones in the world. We have an invisible, negotiated construct that runs smack dab through the middle of it. I love the place. I was married on top of one of its mountain peaks and gave birth to my daughter in one of it's valleys. But I am not of this place, I am but a migrant though I call this place home. The water saturated dense earth of the lower Great Lakes Basin will always be the place by which I measure all other places--home.

Migration used to be easier here. Rivers flowed. This Old Village released the heat of the day to the night. The Marana Agave Fields grew crops irrigated with water that flowed from the North. Oodham boys ready to become men showed they knew the ways of the world by traveling from here to Mar Bermejo, better known now as the Sea of Cortez and back. But then the Sea was undoubtedly called something else as this was before Europeans migrated to, then occupied, then claimed the area as their own and imposed their own place names. I don't say "we" because my ancestors were busy pillaging the Northeastern Coastal lands of El Norte at the time. And none of my ancestors traveled much further to the west than the Great River the Mississippi.

At some point, if we humans as a species do not want to become extinct, we need to get over the testosterone driven need to claim ownership of places and peoples and intangibles. One of the main hindrances to getting over this possession driven patriarchal tendency is a real Frankenstein called the corporation. The corporation has been given the status of a person, but it is an intangible level of organization, a process, that has no ethics, emotions, sense of well being, and can never appreciate the wonder of a newborn child -- yet it is driving the policies and practices of almost all governments and determining life and death for billions of people. These corporations were constructs created by men of power, the same men that divided Mother Earth into little fiefdoms with political structures that fed on the many to the benefit of the few. Most political systems with weapons of mass destruction such as the nuclear powers on the Earth are in male dominated societies. Just because countries are big or powerful doesn't make their power plays right. Just because men are bigger and are aggressive doesn't make it right to try to bully others. But that is just what men and the countries they have created do. Corporations and borders are creations of such societies .

The really sad thing is that the most pathetic puppets of the corporations are the ones who rabidly support the constructs of the those institutions. The vigilantes, the wackos who have the signs such as "GITMO Rocks" in support of the military recruiters across from the protest that happens every week across . These are the folks who would bequite happy to shop in WalMart the rest of their lives. Sad. They really think that being patriarchal and white somehow magically gave them the potential pathway to being rulers... and now they are pissed that they are powerless and want to kick any any dog they can corner. These folks are no different than the KKK and the John Birchers. They have testosterone and no territory to defend so they mistakenly support and defend that of the political and corporate powers apparently believing that when monarchy and state religion are restored that they will somehow benefit. They will still be slathering dogs gratefully licking the hands of their masters. And when unleashed they will gladly kill. These are the sortof people who do hate crimes. The sort of people who burn the flags of neighboring countries not realizing that the powers in those countries want to combine in order to create a better system of exploitation.

The rabid regular joes shooting off their mouths are Nazis, they are just mentally ill or misguided. The ruling folks are just fascists. Most folks don't understand the difference. The Nazis and the Fascists were allied with each other during WWII but they were not coming from the same place at all. The same still holds true. Lew Rockwell a central figure in conservative, libertarian circles explains below,

But what, in Heaven's name, does any of this have to do with "right-wing" theory? By "right wing," the media can mean one of these killer Nazi thugs, or they can mean someone who believes in private property, free enterprise, and bourgeois social norms. The blurring of the difference -- they are really polar opposites -- is wildly dishonest but obviously purposeful.

I doubt things are as purposeful as he thinks. Most people simplify the world into absurd dichotomies. I was reminded of this at Earth Day. The range of folks there was amazing. Diverse. There were liberals and conservatives, vegetarians and hunters, all sides of the immigration issue. Andrew Weil talking about the need for nuclear energy. People talking about animals as though we aren't animal. Wildlife live in habitats, not countries. We cannot stop animals from moving with shifts in prey, vegetation, and water and spacing themselves in the most optimal manner they can find. We cannot stop ourselves from doing this. If we could I guess we'd all be autralopithecines before any of us did the old out of Africa thing.

Because of these borders animals and people die. Lives are drastically altered and ended. 279 people died on my doorstep between 10/1/2004 & 9/30/2005 because of these human constructed concepts. How many animals would be stopped from migrating as they have for countless millenia if a border fence was erected? These are complex issues that cannot be solved simply and perhaps not at all unless we start thinking outside the box. Maybe only people with boxes can think outside of them. Others are too preoccupied with getting in them and drawing them. Of course not all women think holistically. Many have fallen into the sexist dichotomy thing only in an inverse fashion. Women who will only vote for women. Democratic women who are more corporate than religious neocons.

Constructs, constructs, constructs. They aren't real. They aren't interconnected in a logical or ecological fashion. If we as humans are going to allow our lives to be governed by constructs shouldn't the constructs be good ones. Perhaps all should just live the way we want to and allow others to do the same. Maybe we need to build another system altogether--one that is built upon a near universal, simple and inclusive principle: The Golden Rule. The vast majority of all the worlds religions and spiritual perspectives agree.

You may say I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one. I hope someyou will join me and the world will live as one. -- John Lennon

There are those who would have us hate, harm each other, and have us all descend into the depth of darkness they promote. We can be better than that. Calmness and love be with you.

Stop the Hostile Take-over of the Internet!

I just became aware of this attempt by telecommunication giants to take over, privatize, corporatize and basically make the internet a non-regulated utility so they can screw us like the oil industry has done. This fits in as a great follow-up to my earlier rant on the need to focus on media and taking back the Democratic party. This is a media related urgent action item that came into my awarenes via Arizona's PDA (Progressive Democrats of America).

Do it! Sign!

Congress is now pushing a law that would end the free and open Internet as we know it. Internet providers like AT&T and Verizon are lobbying Congress hard to gut Network Neutrality, the Internet's First Amendment. Net Neutrality prevents AT&T from choosing which websites open most easily for you based on which site pays AT&T more. So Amazon doesn't have to outbid Barnes & Noble for the right to work more properly on your computer.

Many members of Congress take campaign contributions from these companies, and they don't think the public are paying attention to this issue. Let's show them we care -please sign this petition today.

I'm Ba-aack...

Where oh where oh where do I start?

Over the next couple weeks I will have a fair amount of time to write so I will be blogging about lots of things that have happened in the last few weeks when I have not been able to post, but before I start playing catch up I thought I should warn regular readers about my state of mind and what has been going on with me. There are three key things I have to work toward: taking back the media, taking back the religious discourse, and taking back the Democratic Party. I'm hot under the collar about these things. These are processes which we have to regain control of or authority in before any change can really occur.

I came to a realization that my personal situation had some parallels with our political situation. I have to take care of myself and fix some major problems inside myself (such as the gall stones that have convinced me to let them cut my gall bladder out early next week) before I will be able to truly be effective in my interactions with the world. Similarly we have to remove the corrupted elements of our representative democracy before we can be an effective player on Team Gaia.

At the end of February I awakened one night with horrific pain under my ribs on my right side that shot through all the way to the back that I can only describe as on par with the severity of pain involved with labor & birth. A few days later I found out my elderly (over 90) mother fell and broke her hip. This was while I was attempting to organize an International Women's Day vigil, a progressive fast between that day and the Tucson's March 18th rally and march on the 3rd anniversary of the war in Iraq for which I was also hoping to stir up a significant pink presence. I was also planning a stop in Tucson by one of the Iraqi women who began a speaking tour of the U.S. in March and April as a part of the Women Say No To War campaign. I dropped everything and went back to the Mid-West. Women's lives (and many men's lives too) get very complicated when the squeeze of career, children, and arranging for or providing the caretaking of an elderly parent really tightens down.

At some point, as I was sitting in the wifi connected coffee shop in the rural town in which I grew up, I experienced an epiphany and realized that not only do I detest the actions of the entire Bush Oligarchy (oil-igarchy?) I am personally pissed off at Bush because he is forcing me to put so much energy into pro-peace activities to counter their evil doings that I am not able to do the things I'd really like to be doing . I would really like to be arranging my poetry into a coherent manuscript, researching and continuing work on a biography of Gene Stratton-Porter, finishing several art projects, hanging with my teenage daughter in these blink of the eye moments before she heads off to college, doing sorely needed repairs on my home, getting several of my websites either up and running or back up, and countless other really important things. Not only are the policies of these vile men and women screwing up the world I live in to levels that may well signal the end of life as we know it, but my personal life and well-being within the moment are being impinged upon.

I need to act. It is a real need that has to be fulfilled. The only way I can explain it is in the colloquial language of the place where I was raised. I heard a call. And paraphrasing my folksinger friend Carrie Newcomer says, "when you hear/feel this type of call, you have to answer." It is that simple. Who places that call and how it is placed are up for debate, but for me it is connected to those spiritual level things that are based in belief systems and not in logical & scientific systems of knowing.

I'm not hiding my religious beliefs any longer. I've always thought that my religion, how I interact with the world of spirit and flesh, was nobody's business but my own. I still think that. But my beliefs that come from that personal understanding of religion (I'm very Protestant in that sense, I guess.) That understanding translates to my morality and my concepts of worth, my values if you will. I am sick and tired of corrupt, carpet-bagging, war-mongers calling me morally bankrupt and insinuating that my values are somehow tainted. I am a good person, at peace with the deity as I understand her, and I am gonna get righteous on people's asses when they try to pull that crap on me! Conflict resolution is a good thing, but be cannot compromise on our beliefs. Negotiations necessary to the ultimate declaration of peace will require great diplomacy, but no one should have to compromise their faith and bend to the will of another person's faith in the pursuit of that peace.

I'm tired of imposition by others into my right to believe and act in virtuous ways as dictated by my religion. Bush and his cronies are not only occupying Iraq, they are attempting to possess my soul. They are demons. Am I going too far? Okay, okay, but I do like theatrics. But you get my point. Gonzales, for example, doesn't give a *bleep* about child pornography, he is orchestrating a campaign to restrict internet freedom and privacy and is using an issue with a moral hair trigger to do it. The method is the same one used by this administration time and time again. They justify an action by inciting a mob mentality and then turn around and lynch the folks who were in the mob. Family values and the "abortion issue" were mere propaganda tools to divert the populace from stolen elections, illegal consolidation of power in the presidency, steering away from combating the real terrorist threats against our country, destroying the Bill of Rights, and setting up a completely corporate ruled fascist state. This has been enabled by Democrats who don't stand for anything and journalists who value their checks cut by corporate media more than their integrity.

We've got to multitask, keep the faith, and recognize that we are working on product and process simultaneously.

I am the walrus.